Advice services being squeezed - new report from LVSC

The London Voluntary Services Council annual Big Squeeze report has just been published. Working with partners across the voluntary and community sector, the report collects and analyses a range of evidence, including 252 responses to an on-line survey, to assess funding, demand and responses to the current economic climate. Amongst the findings, were the following key points:

* 90% of organisations continue to change the way they work in order to adapt to changes and better meet users’ needs
* 60% reported a reduction in their overall funding in 2012–13 with a median decrease of 21–40%
* 41% closed services over the year
* 29% expect to close services in 2012–13
* 66% have seen an increase in demand for their services in the last year, particularly for advice services
* 71% expect demand to increase next year
* 50% think they will not be able to meet this increase
* 85% think that cuts to local authority budgets had a particularly negative impact on their communities
* 83% said that their users had been negatively affected by loss of services that meet their needs, particularly advice services
* 63% said that welfare reforms had disadvantaged the communities with which they work
* 56% said their users had been negatively affected by worklessness and 48% said their users’ health was worse

For more details about the survey, see Big Squeeze 2012